Carbon Nanotubes from Camphor: An Environment-Friendly Nanotechnology
Abstract
High-purity carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are produced by chemical vapour deposition of camphor, an environment-friendly hydrocarbon. In a small CVD reactor (1-m long and 26- mm wide), CVD of 3 g camphor at 650°C for 1 hour yields ~1.62 g MWNTs of diameter ~10 nm with an as-grown purity over 88%; that is, camphor-to-CNT production efficiency is 50%. This is the highest efficiency ever achieved from any material by any method. Moreover, camphor-based CNT synthesis technique stands fairly good against the 12-principle protocol of green chemistry.
- Publication:
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Journal of Physics Conference Series
- Pub Date:
- March 2007
- DOI:
- 10.1088/1742-6596/61/1/129
- Bibcode:
- 2007JPhCS..61..643K